Translation tool for above (you can enter a URL and it will translate the whole site

To use Twitter for this project, I recommend a few things:

1. Open a TweetDeck or HootSuite account to manage your streams

2. Click on links! You can't base your research on 140 character messages.

3. To find links to Facebook pages about unrest, keep an eye out for URLs that include fb like http://fb.me/UfDYEq3G BEWARE! This is the real world and there may be inappropriate content including violent images. Be responsible. Use Babelfish to translate.

Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Juniors took surveys before and after completing the social studies research paper last fall. We are starting to aggregate responses to determine what was learned from the assignment. The chart on the left compares growth, as articulated by juniors (left column), to recommended skills for 21st century citizenship (according to the Partnership for 21st Century Learning).
What do we need to focus on this time?

Please take the spring research paper survey. You will see that there is special emphasis on the skills juniors did not mention in the fall questionnaire. To help you become well-rounded learners, we will embed interpersonal communication and participatory learning in the research process this time. Please feel free to voice your thoughts on this in the open ended questions.

Okay! Our facebook group is done NCHS 2011 English Junior Research Paper. If it doesn't show up in your list of fb groups (left side of your personal fb home page), please join. It is only open for the next day or so until we get everyone in, then we will make it private. I am an admin, so please let me know if you have concerns.

Your homework for tonight is to post your topic in the group. We will meet in the library tomorrow.

On Wednesday, we are going to segregate by electronic apparatus. Fair? Unfair? Humm... maybe you're right. That would be a great subject for research paper. But let's do it anyway, because it's just going to make our time together more productive.

Students with smart phones, iPod touches and laptops will sit at the two big tables closest to the windows in the "green dot" area.

People without those devices will use library computers.

People with complicated search terms, like "mental toughness", meet me at the table between the computers and the two big tables closest to the windows in the "green dot" area. We're going on a tour.

Monday, February 7, 2011

Log in with your own user name and password (same one you use to log on to network at school). You can make a bibliography of your books in here! Your decade is an excellent search term (i.e.1930s - no apostrophe), but it will generate huge returns, so you can combine it with politics, economics, religion, social, intellectual, aesthetic, geography, or technology (i.e. 1930s AND technology)

Remember that there are many ways to search for PERSIA+GT without using the search terms politics, economics, religion, social, intellectual, aesthetic, geography, or technology. This is just an array of alternatives for politics:

Print reference books:REF 973 Timetabl: TimeTables of American History breaks down each year according to PERSIA +GTREF 902.02 GRUN: Timetables of World History is good too, in case you can't get your hands on the first - I know this is a U.S. class, but world affairs apply too!REF 973.91: 1910s, 1920s, 1930s, etc. books are very helpful. Use them. REF 973 AMERI: American Decades (both in hard copy, and in digital version in Gale Virtual Reference Library, and the History Resource Center).

Use resources under "Citing" to help build your bibliography. Remember to start documenting your research today! Check your own bibliography with the online tool! http://tiny.cc/bibeval

You are expected to meet with your group members and agree on the 2-3 most important changes that occurred during your decade, and describe what you think of those changes. Post this information to the comments below, and be sure to include your group members' names in your post. I moderate comments, so they will not appear right away.

Thursday, February 3, 2011

You can easily search for your revolution in the online catalog. Occasionally, your revolution will have a "shifty" name, meaning that its name has changed over time. In that case, you will search for the place or date of revolution's origin (i.e., Iran AND revolution AND 1979) or leader(s) - either outgoing or incoming instead (Iran AND [shah OR khomeini]). If you are combining AND and OR, it is important to use the parentheses to tell the computer how to combine your keywords - aha! you DO need math in history!

eBooks:

I can't include the database page user name and password here, but you can find all that information and more on page 41 of you NCHS planner. Watch tutorial about that.

Also, when off campus, you will need to enter user names and password to access eBooks.

Databases:

Remember to check the "key" for user name and password information (log in to your Google Apps [first.last@ncps-k-12.org] account to access) on the databases page. The authentication information varies, depending on who provides the service and who pays for it - the school, the town, the school.

Recommended databases for this project (general to specific):

Encyclopaedia Britannica (general encyclopedia)

ABC-CLIO (like a huge textbook)

History in Context (much more detailed information, including documents)

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

Catalog:All of these are pretty easy to look up in the online catalog except the colonial wars and the Indian wars, because they stretch over time and place. Most books on these topics are in the 973.2 section, but there are regional books on the colonies in the 974s - you'll remember those from the colonies project.

Recommended eBooks: You will need to log in to access these. Remember that ABC-CLIO and Gale eBooks have different login information. All log on information is available on the database page and in the Library Moodle. To access the database page, do not enter your personal user name and password. The correct one can be found on page 41 of your NCHS planner.

Remember that you can search all of these at once through the Gave Virtual Reference Library portal.

Databases: For all wars, you can start with ABC-CLIO: World at War

For the following wars, use History Resource Center and the Proquest Historical Hartford Courant (goes back to 1775) when you are done with ABC-CLIO

North American Colonial Wars to 1775

American Revolution 1775-1883

American Indian Wars 1492-1890

War of 1812

Mexican-American War 1846-1848

For the following wars, use History Resource Center and ProQuest Historical Newspapers when you are done with ABC-CLIO. Remember that the names of wars change over time, and that in ProQuest Historical Newspapers, you need to use the original terminology (i.e., World War I was called "The Great War" until World War II, but not until after the Treaty of Versailles - during the actual conflict, it didn't have a name, it was just called war). For 20th century wars, SIRS Decades might have some primary sources.

American Civil War 1861-1865

Spanish-American and Philippine-American Wars 1898-1902

World War I 1914-1917

World War II 1939-1945

Cold War 1945-1989

Korean War 1950-1953

Arab-Israeli Wars 1948-1973

Vietnam War 1961-1975

For the following wars, use ProQuest Platinum, Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center, and Global Issues in Context, when you are done with ABC-CLIO. You might find primary sources in SIRS Decades might have some primary sources.